


Fever

by hjbender



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Family, Fever, Fictitious Diseases, Gen, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Major Illness, Medical Procedures, Needles, Parental Hera Syndulla, Parental Kanan Jarrus, Post-Episode: s02e05 Always Two There Are, Sick Character, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:06:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27119990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hjbender/pseuds/hjbender
Summary: When Ezra gets infected with a life-threatening virus, Hera and Kanan risk everything to save him.
Relationships: Ezra Bridger & Hera Syndulla, Ezra Bridger & Kanan Jarrus, Kanan Jarrus/Hera Syndulla
Comments: 13
Kudos: 135





	Fever

He probably picked it up at the old Republic medical base. Who knows what kinds of contagions had been percolating within its walls since its abandonment. The biohazardous refuse that had been left behind was probably a cosmos of mutated bacteria and viruses by now.

None of the Spectre Crew had thought to ask if Ezra had received all of his childhood vaccinations before he set foot in there. None of them had reason to suspect he was vulnerable, or that, being the son of “hostile citizens”, he had never been immunized against common viral diseases such as _elgorria_ and _papera_. The Empire controlled the healthcare system on Lothal and could deny treatment to whomever they pleased. 

The Bridgers, having a reputation as strong opponents of the Imperial occupation, had been unable to procure the vaccinations that their son needed. They did all they could to keep Ezra safe and healthy, stocking up on whatever medicine they could acquire through networks within the resistance and sequestering him at the first sign of a sniffle, but all that ended when they were arrested and taken away. Ezra grew up without knowing just how delicate his immune system was.

He knew now.

It came on about three days after he and Zeb and Sabine returned from the medical base. He became lethargic and moody, which nobody thought remarkable. He was a teenager; lethargy and moodiness were a given, especially for someone with the responsibilities Ezra had.

But then he lost his appetite. _That_ drew attention. Ezra could put away food like a famished Hutt. He ate more than Zeb and always seemed to have room for seconds (or thirds). So when he excused himself from the galley one evening and went straight to bed, Hera and Kanan had looked at each other with the same thought: _something is wrong_.

Kanan went in to check on him and found him sleeping in Zeb’s bunk, as if he didn’t even have the energy to climb to the upper berth. He had also stripped down to his tank top and undershorts and peeled off his socks, which were balled up beside his bare feet. Hera kept the _Ghost_ at a steady 16 degrees centigrade to save on energy, and while teenage boys ran notoriously hot, Ezra seldom slept in so few clothes. And he wasn’t even under the blanket.

Kanan sat down on the edge of the bunk and grasped Ezra’s shoulder. His skin was warm, but it wasn’t burning. He gave him a shake.

“Ezra.”

A creaky murmur.

“Hey, sorry to wake you. I just wanted to make sure you’re okay. It’s not like you to skip dinner.”

“M’ fine. Just tired.”

“Is there anything on your mind? I’m here if you need to talk.” Kanan offered because nine times out of ten Ezra’s problems were related to his emotions. And Kanan was that age once, too. He knew what it was like.

“No, nothing on my mind. I’m just… been real tired lately.” A heavy sigh.

Kanan pulled off his glove and laid his bare hand on Ezra’s cheek. It was hot, flushed pink. He touched Ezra’s forehead. It was also hot—and completely dry.

“I think you might be coming down with something. You feel feverish.”

Ezra mumbled something unintelligible. 

Kanan left the room and returned a short while later with a thermo scanner from the ship’s infirmary. He bent down and pressed the scanner to Ezra’s temple. When he read the numbers on the display, his eyebrows shot up.

“You’re running pretty hot. I’m gonna get you some medicine. Are you allergic to salicet or omnicillin?”

“Dunno. Never taken them before.”

Kanan frowned. Chances were slim, but the last thing he wanted to do was give Ezra something that could send him into anaphylactic shock. Maybe it was better to try a holistic approach for the time being, see if that did anything, then use the medicine as a last resort.

He covered the boy with a blanket and went to find Hera.

After apprising her of the situation, she agreed. They would treat Ezra’s symptoms and see if they cleared up on their own. Better to be cautious; the last place a group of Rebels needed to be was the emergency ward of an Imperial medcenter.

Despite the blankets and extra pillows they scrounged up and the electrolyte-infused fluids they poured into him, Ezra did not improve. Twenty-four hours later a terrible headache had set in, bringing with it body aches and chills, and he couldn’t stop squirming beneath the covers. His skin crawled and he was sick to his stomach, and he became sensitive to light. Soon his voice turned raspy and weak, he developed a cough, and the lymph nodes in his neck swelled. Even when he slept, his brow was furrowed and his face was twisted into an expression of restless misery. 

It was difficult being on mission with a sick crew member, but Hera and Kanan were determined to do both. They had little choice; no other cells in this sector had the firepower and experience they had. It was them or nobody.

They worked in shifts. One of them visited Ezra every hour to bring him more juice or help him to the head—he was too weak and dizzy to walk on his own—but soon he began to refuse the food they brought him. Hera tried to spoon-feed him some porridge and he ended up vomiting. 

That was not a good sign.

She went to Kanan and expressed her concern. They decided to crack open a capsule of omnicillin and give Ezra half, just in case he had a reaction.

Ezra didn’t react to the antibiotic. At all. Not even when they tripled the dose the next day. His symptoms grew worse and the numbers on the thermo scanner steadily crept upward. 

“Whatever it is, it’s viral,” Hera said.

Kanan cursed softly and ran his hand over his head. 

It was late, the rest of the crew asleep. Captain and first mate sat at the table in the common area, hunched over steaming cups of pure caffeine. They were both absolutely drained.

“We have to postpone this mission,” said Kanan, lifting his eyes from his cup after a long period of reflection. 

“I agree. We can’t wait any longer.”

“I’ll take the _Phantom_ to the nearest planet and get him some medicine.”

“He needs a doctor, Kanan. We can’t cure him until we know what’s wrong with him.”

“Every medcenter in this system is Empire-run.”

“So we’ll go to a system that isn’t. Surely there are smaller medcenters we can take him to, local ones where no one will recognize us.”

“You mean clinics where a burned-out medical droid will treat him without even looking at him? Where it takes twenty different medicines and a kriffing month before they finally figure out what’s wrong with him? We’d be better off diagnosing him ourselves.”

Hera sighed. “Alright, love, what do you suggest we do?”

Kanan tapped the table with his finger, thinking. “Sabine and I will make a run on the first big medcenter we find. I’ll grab as many medicines I can carry. Whatever we don’t use we can give to people in need. I’ll have Sabine lift a few medical discs while we’re there, and then we’ll have Chopper run a search on Ezra’s symptoms when we get back. We’ll figure out which medicine he needs, give it to him, and in a few days this will all be a distant memory.”

It wasn’t his best plan, and Hera’s expression reflected that, but it was the best plan they had right now. As the saying goes, a good plan today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll tell Sabine to get ready.”

* * *

Kanan and Sabine left within the hour, leaving Hera, Zeb and Chopper to tend to Ezra. Hera closed off the cockpit and contacted Fulcrum, let them know the situation. Fulcrum was understanding and wished a swift recovery for their sick crewmate. Hera then slunk to her cabin, defeated and dismal, and slept while Zeb sat vigil over Ezra.

When she woke up a few hours later and went to relieve Zeb, he informed her that there had been no word from Kanan and Sabine yet. Hera hoped they hadn’t run into any trouble. 

She sat down on the stool beside the bunk and checked Ezra’s temperature. He was half a degree hotter, entering dangerous territory now. He had pulled off most of the blankets in his sleep so she fixed them, tucking them around his small, overheated body. She asked Chopper to bring her some water and more salicet.

Ezra woke to a cool, damp cloth on his burning forehead. “M-Mom,” he mumbled.

Hera didn’t bother to correct him. “I’m here,” she said with a brave smile.

Ezra gazed at her through bruised, half-lidded eyes. His complexion was dull and sallow, the only color being the febrile patches of red on his cheeks. He licked his dry, sticky lips and croaked, “I don’t feel so good.”

“I know, honey. It’s gonna be okay. Here, drink some juice.” 

She held a carton with a straw to his mouth. He took a few swallows, throat bobbing as he drank, before he spit out the straw and let his head sink back into the pillow. It wasn’t enough, but it was better than nothing.

Hera set the carton aside and took the cloth from his forehead—it had warmed by now—and dipped it into the nearby bowl of water. She wrung it out, brushed Ezra’s dark hair back from his face, and laid the folded cloth back in its place.

“Where’s Dad?”

“He went to get medicine for you. He’ll be back very soon.” She touched his florid cheek and wished that she could take this illness from him, just absorb it like a sponge. She had never been able to stand watching people, especially those she loved, suffer. That was why she was here now, doing what she was doing. “Hang in there, sweetheart.”

“Mm.” Ezra closed his eyes. His brows drew together in a frown. “Tell Dad to… watch the instruments.” 

“I will.”

The muscles in his face relaxed. Hera patted his cheek. No response. She lifted his eyelid and shined a light into his eye. The pupil remained the same size. She dropped the light and pressed her shaking fingers to his carotid artery. A steady pulse. He was still alive.

“Chopper!”

The droid wheeled into the room, beeping and booping.

“Hail the Phantom. Tell them to hurry. Spectre-6 is critical.”

“Wup wup!” Chopper saluted and sped away to the cockpit to place the communiqué.

Hera folded her hands together, leaned on the edge of the bunk, and closed her eyes.

* * *

After five of the longest hours of Hera Syndulla’s life, the _Phantom_ docked to the _Ghost_ and Kanan and Sabine dropped down through the hatch.

Kanan looked as if he had just run through a warzone. His nose was bloodied, his hair loose, and the shoulder of his shirt was split open and singed from where a blaster had grazed him. The flesh beneath was lacerated and blood had saturated the surrounding cloth, turning it an oozy black. He carried a padded case with an Imperial medical logo emblazoned on its surface. Sabine was less bloody and more charred, her armor coated with gypsum. Hera was stunned at the sight of them.

“What _happened_ down there?”

Kanan was already on his way to the sleeping quarters. “No time to explain. Get those discs to Chopper and bring him in here!”

Every member of the crew ran en masse to Zeb and Ezra’s cabin like a group of desperate field medics. Sabine fed the discs into Chopper’s information ports while Kanan cracked open the case, revealing an entire library of medicine vials. Zeb tore into a box of syringes and passed one to Kanan. 

“I need sterilizer,” said Kanan.

Zeb handed him a bottle and a pack of sterile pads. Hera pulled Ezra’s arm, limp and hot, out from under the covers and turned it so that the veiny underside showed. Kanan gracelessly poured a full ounce of sterilizing liquid onto the vein at the juncture of Ezra’s elbow. The excess ran down his arm and dripped onto the floor. He wiped the area clean with a sterile pad, uncapped a syringe, and carefully inserted it into Ezra’s vein. He pulled 1cc of blood from Ezra’s arm and then snapped the collection ampule out of the syringe. He handed it to Sabine, and Sabine gave it to Chopper—the droid who in the last five minutes had become a certified pathologist—for analysis.

The _Ghost_ crew held their breaths while the droid’s processor whirred and clicked.

Kanan tapped his fist against his lips and bounced his leg. “Come on, come on,” he whispered.

Hera put her arm around his shoulders.

After three minutes that passed at the speed of hours, there came an affirmative beep. A diagnosis flashed on Chopper’s holoprojector.

“Haurren meningitis!” Sabine cheered. 

Hera paled. 

Haurren meningitis. Brain fever, viral. One of the varieties that primarily affected—and killed—young children. 

Kanan sprang into action. He rifled through the medical case, searching for the correct medicine. He found it, ripped the cartridge from its sleeve, and inserted it into the new syringe Zeb gave to him. He pulled the cap off with his teeth and stuck the needle in Ezra’s arm. The plunger went down line by line, delivering the lifesaving drug into Ezra’s bloodstream. When the syringe was empty, Kanan withdrew the needle, put the cap back on, and gave it to Hera for disposal. Then he laid his hand over the small puncture on Ezra’s arm and closed his eyes.

“Now we wait,” he said.

An uneasy quiet settled over the room. Hera sat down beside Kanan and slipped her arm around his waist, rested her head on his shoulder. Sabine took a seat in the corner and quietly began to explain what happened on Urdina.

“Everything was going smoothly at first,” she said. “We landed the _Phantom_ on the roof and snuck in through the cleaning access. We split up on the fifth floor. I went to find the medical archive and Kanan went looking for the supply lab. And then…” She lowered her eyes.

“Then I knocked over an instrument tray,” Kanan finished. He shook his head as if he were still disgusted with himself.

Hera’s eyes widened.

_Tell Dad to… watch the instruments._

“I hadn’t even found the lab yet, but I wasn’t going to leave without getting that medicine. They called in the Stormtroopers, and after we had cut through about half of them, the stragglers called for backup. Two Inquisitors showed up. We were lucky to get out of there alive.”

“But we did,” Sabine reminded him.

“Yeah, we did.” Kanan reached out and laid his sooty hand on Ezra’s forehead. It was still hot. “The _Phantom_ took a few hits. One of the rear thrusters is out. She’ll need repairs before she’s spaceworthy again.”

“Chop and I will take care of it,” said Hera. “You and Sabine did a great job, but you both need to get cleaned up. And you need to let me take a look at that shoulder. The wound’s filthy.”

“I don’t want to leave him. Not again.”

Though his head was turned, Hera could see the guilt pinching Kanan’s face. He blamed himself for the delay, for the critical hours Ezra had spent lying here unconscious when a better man would have been back sooner. 

If only Ezra knew there was no better man than this one, Hera thought. 

“You’ll be here when he wakes up, I’ll make sure of it.” She stroked Kanan’s tangled, dirty hair. “At least let me wipe the blood off your face and put a bacta patch on your shoulder. You’re going to need it later, you know.”

Kanan gave her a sheepish look. “You’re right. I’m being silly, aren’t I.”

“No, you’re being”— _a worried father_ , she almost said—“completely normal.” She rose to her feet. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

* * *

A new kind of tension descended over the crew as they waited for any change in Ezra’s condition. With their mission scrubbed, they had nothing to do but sleep or try to keep their minds occupied on something other than worrying. Zeb, too keyed up to rest, played chess with Chopper until the droid’s relentless cheating finally drove him to find something to watch on the holonet. Sabine showered and then shut herself in her cabin, the throb of sythpop and the hiss of her airbrushes the only sounds emanating from within. A stranger would have thought her actions aloof, but this was how she dealt with tension and circumstances beyond her control: releasing it through art. Hera was finally able to convince Kanan to make use of the refresher. He was back before he was dried or even fully dressed, asking if Ezra had done anything more than breathe while he was gone. 

He hadn’t, Hera informed him. It had only been seven minutes.

Kanan deflated. It was a heartbreaking sight.

Hera sat him on a crate and tended to his wounds with skill and efficiency that would have impressed any nurse. After that, there was nothing to do but wait.

Kanan wasn’t going to leave Ezra’s side, so Hera brought him some cushions and a blanket. Sitting on a bare metal floor wasn’t just uncomfortable, it was cold. Kanan didn’t care if it was, but he appreciated Hera’s kindness and thanked her for all that she had done—and everything she was still doing.

Hera pecked his cheek and told him to get some sleep. Captain’s orders.

Kanan folded his arms on the edge of the bunk and laid his head down. He didn’t think he could sleep, so he meditated. For some reason the mantra of his childhood was the only comfort he found.

_Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony._

He grasped Ezra’s wrist. His thumb and finger touched on the side, where he could feel life, delicate and clinging, pulse among the small bones.

_There is no death. There is the Force._

_There is no death._

_Only the Force._

* * *

Movement woke him. Something damp stirred beneath his hand and then slipped away. 

Kanan opened his eyes and lifted his head. His neck hurt. His back ached. His legs were numb. His shoulder throbbed and his nose still felt swollen. How long had he been out? And what was— 

He shot upright, fully alert.

Ezra was moving, his eyes shut, lethargically pushing the blankets off with his feet. He was drenched in sweat. His face glistened with it, beautiful, healthy sweat. His hair was matted to his forehead and cheeks, his tank top saturated at the chest and armpits.

His fever had broken.

“Ezra!” Kanan’s voice was high and shaky but full of joy. He touched Ezra’s arm. “Are you awake? Can you hear me?”

“Nngh.” A wince, a frown. Then a pair of blue eyes fluttered open and found Kanan’s face. “I have to pee.”

Kanan laughed through his tears.

Everything was going to be okay.


End file.
